Volcano expert: Going down internet rabbit holes possibly more dangerous than Yellowstone volcano

POWELL — While reports of an impending eruption of the Yellowstone volcano are popular on internet sites and social media, the reports are greatly exaggerated, according to a U.S. Geological Survey geophysicist.
Verifiable facts shared by the agency are commonly used to sound the alarm. 
But those facts are often used out of context to drive clicks, said Michael Poland, a geophysicist at the Yellowstone Volcano Observatory. And they cheapen the Yellowstone experience, he claims.
“In an effort to get people to watch their YouTube channel or documentary, they play up that Yellowstone is a powder keg or ticking time bomb. I can’t stand those phrases,” Poland said. “It’s a disservice to the place. It’s cheap. It’s lazy.”
The June 12 flood that devastated the northern section of Yellowstone National Park — which coincided with an earthquake swarm that included a 4.2 magnitude rumbler in the northeast corner of the park — has been cited as proof of impending doom for those in Yellowstone National Park and beyond.  
An internet search of the volcano produces many such reports.
Poland confirmed the flood was the worst in recorded history and there were nearly 150 measurable earthquakes in the ecosystem in June — 67 in a swarm near Mammoth Hot Springs. 
But none of these events have affected the volcano.  It is resting peacefully.
In the long history of monitoring rivers in the Yellowstone area, the June flood was unprecedented. There is a stream gauge on the Yellowstone River in Corwin Springs, just north of Yellowstone National Park. Records from the gauge have been kept since 1892. 
The previous high watermark there was 11 1/2-feet, occurring in 1980, along with a flow rate of about 32,000 cubic feet per second. On June 13, the gauge recorded a flood level of 14 feet, and the flow rate was in excess of 50,000 cubic feet per second. It caused tremendous damage to the road system and rock slides.
Yet Poland said the only noticeable difference to the geothermal ecosystem was a little added moisture to the system. The result: The time between eruptions at geysers like Old Faithful may decrease slightly.
“There’s a statistical correlation between precipitation and the interval between eruptions. In wet years, Old Faithful, for example, will erupt slightly more frequently. In drier years, it erupts less frequently. A single rainfall event doesn’t make for a wet or dry year,” he said.

Steamboat Springs, the largest geyser in the world, erupted twice in June. But compared to 2019 and 2020, when the geyser popped off 48 times each of those years, it was half the excitement of
recent history.
In June, an earthquake swarm hit Yellowstone. A swarm of 67 earthquakes began June 12 and continued through the latter part of the month. Another swarm of 29 earthquakes followed further south in the park and, yet another small swarm happened in the southern reaches of the park before the end of the month.
“That’s a pretty average month in the park,” Poland said. “The swarm with 67 events actually started before the rain started falling. The biggest event of the swarm was 2.4 magnitude. And that’s, you know, pretty garden variety. I think we’ve had about 30 magnitude two events so far this year.”
The 4.2 magnitude event was the only earthquake that could have been felt. It happened deep under the earth’s surface and was felt by scientists, Poland said, but most people didn’t notice. 
“Even then a lot of people might not have even realized that it was an earthquake and thought a truck went by or somebody dropped something heavy in their house,” he said.
Another red flag fear mongers point to is Yellowstone volcano’s high threat levels published by government officials. 
The U.S. Geological Survey website lists the volcano in “code orange,” a designation reserved for the second highest threats on the scale. Poland said that is indeed a fact. 
But that particular threat level denotes the threat to surrounding infrastructure and potential victims, and has nothing to do with a timetable of doom.
“If you look on our map, Yellowstone is characterized as a high threat volcano,” Poland verified. “Some people and some websites, especially those who want to make a buck, have conflated that orange symbol. They’re taking the threat level — which has nothing to do with current activity — and trying to make it sound like it does. Currently, Yellowstone is green,” he said.
Claims are also made that a nuclear bomb, supposedly to be sent by Russia for U.S. involvement in the war in Ukraine, will cause the sleeping giant to pile out of bed. Poland calls the theories uninformed.
“What’s funny is the stories change with the times,” he said. “A little while ago, Kim Jong Un was going to nuke Yellowstone. Now it’s Putin is going to nuke Yellowstone. Whoever the bad guy is at the moment is going to nuke Yellowstone. A nuclear bomb will have no impact whatsoever on the volcano.”
He pointed out nuclear bombs detonate in the atmosphere, not on impact. Even if the bad guys rigged a bomb to detonate on impact, much of the energy would still be forced into the atmosphere. 
He pointed out that the 7.5 magnitude earthquake that hit Hebgen Lake, Montana, in the late 50s happened below ground, “essentially next to the magma chamber,” he said.
An earthquake that size has the equivalent destructive energy as a moderate-sized nuclear weapon, yet Yellowstone did not erupt in 1959.
“It kind of makes sense, right? Nuke Yellowstone, make it erupt. But physically, that’s not the way it works,” he said. “The theory is demonstrably false.”
Attempts to reassure those calling the observatory checking to see what day the supervolcano is going to erupt often fall on deaf ears. 
Poland is a government official and not to be trusted, some claim.
“I don’t think you’ll need me to call you if that happens. If it was going to erupt, it would be felt. There would be earthquakes galore, the ground would be moving up like crazy, there would be really insane changes in geyser activity and thermal activity and gas emissions,” he said. “It would be really obvious to everyone and every geologist in the world would be screaming about it.” 
Joseph Bard, a geologist for the Survey stationed at the Cascade Volcano Observatory, points out there are 161 active volcanoes in the U.S., including territories like the Mariana Islands. 
More than 50 of them are classified as very high or high threats, but, of course, the rating system isn’t intended to signify their potential to erupt, but rather the damage they would do if they erupted.
Bard’s recent presentation points are likely to spawn even more crazy speculation. 
The trick is to not believe every word you read, scientists warn. The study of volcanoes has come a long way in the past century, and warning residents in the vicinity of volcanoes is the most important part of the scientist’s job.
Poland would tell those who fear volcanoes that they are more likely to be killed by an earthquake than any garden variety active volcano on the planet. 
More than 28 people were killed in the earthquake at Hebgen Lake. On Dec. 26, 2004, an undersea earthquake with a magnitude of 9.1 struck off the coast of Sumatra. 
A tsunami triggered by the quake spread out across the Indian Ocean, devastating coastal areas as far away as East Africa. The tsunami killed more than 225,000 people.
“We don’t have any warning system for earthquakes,” he said. “We don’t know that a strong earthquake is about to happen.”
 
 
This story was published on July 14, 2022.